What To Look for In Puppy Training Courses

Since the COVID-19 pandemic began, there has been a significant rise in dog and puppy ownership. Concurrently, demand for training sessions and courses has also gone up. Here are some tips on what you should look for when you want to train your puppy:

1. Does the trainer offer a set number of sessions, or keep things open-ended charging per session? Set number of sessions provide trainers and course providers with greater incentives to offer real value, whereas open-ended sessions can be abused to keep clients ignorant and believing they are reliant on a trainer

2. Does the trainer run dedicated one-on-one sessions or unstructured group play? The former is always better than the latter. While it is key that young dogs are properly socialized, this must be in a controlled and supervised environment. Unstructured play groups leave far too much to chance, and may result in unwanted negative associations being developed with other dogs, or even oversocialisation which can cause problems later in life

3. Does the trainer proof behaviours in the real world? It is easy to train a dog to sit in an empty garden free of distractions, but unless they will follow a command in the real world it will not have been worth much. The best trainers will take your puppy to work in a range of settings they are likely to encounter with you, ultimately preparing them for success later in life